Pages

Wednesday, June 06, 2012

Bob McDonnell Steps In It .... Then Steps In It Again

Earlier this month, before the Virginia General Assembly voted to reject Tracy Thorne-Begland—see post HERE-- a gay judicial nominee, Bob
McDonnell, the GOP governor said homosexuality should not disqualify someone from serving as a judge. And he said that's always been his
position.

“I have long been an advocate
of judicial selection based on merit,” McDonnell said on WTOP’s “Ask the
Governor.”

He recalled for
the governor, who, like most Republicans, has difficulty remembering which
bigoted remarks they uttered and when they uttered them, the time back in 2003
when McDonnell himself lead a successful effort to unseat a lesbian
Circuit Court judge. See, then-delegate McDonnell actually questioned whether
someone who had engaged in oral or anal sex could serve as a judge because that
behavior would violate the state’s anti-sodomy statute.

And, when asked about that today, McDonnell said to
Seagraves, “No, I think you got that out of context.”

And Seagraves asked, "What
is context for it?”

"Bob McDonnell,
stammered, as he tried to recall his open bigotry from 2003 and how to mesh it
with his closeted bigotry of 2012, and said, “What I said was someone, at the
time, actually there were certain acts that would be a crime —”

“It’s 2003. Anti-sodomy laws,”
said Mark Seagraves.

McDonnell responded, “Right.
If someone had [committed] a crime, honestly that would call into question
their ability to be a judge. But I was very clear in other statements of the
time that those factors should not be an element of the decision making.”

Now, digging back into
history, that lesbian, Judge Verbena Askew was not reappointed for a
second, eight-year term, though McDonnell says it had nothing to do with her
orientation. It was due to the fact that Askew had been accused of sexually harassing
a female court employee and had not disclosed the woman’s lawsuit against her,
as required, on her judicial application.

“There were a lot of things,
Mark, that led to that decision,” McDonnell said. “This [her homosexuality] was
not a factor. And so I’m disappointed that people still would say that.”

But, Seagraves wanted to know,
what if there had been no sexual harassment allegation? What if there had been
no undisclosed lawsuit to raise questions about her truthfulness? What if she’d
simply been a gay judge having gay sex at a time when that was illegal in
Virginia? Would that have been okay?

“Mark, that’s 10 years ago,”
McDonnell said. “When somebody violates the law, then it’s going to make it
hard for them to be a judge, don’t you agree? ... But that’s not what happened
in that case.”

The U.S. Supreme Court struck
down anti-sodomy laws later in 2003 and so Seagraves asked if the
now-invalidated law might still be used to disqualify those gay judicial
nominees who were sexually active in Virginia before the Supreme Court ruling
because they would, in fact, be criminals.

The question appeared to catch
McDonnell off guard: “What I, the law at the time, and so, I —”

Once he was able to compose himself, and fighting the pain of his own past words biting him on the ass, McDonnell said he would not object to a gay nominee
“if they are otherwise qualified to be on the bench based on merit, ability,
judicial temperament and ability to follow the law regardless of what their
political beliefs are.”

But that's today. That's not
the Bob McDonnell of 2003, no matter how much he tries to spin it. And it
certainly wasn't Bob McDonnell who stepped in on behalf of Throne-Begland and
asked the Virginia House to keep his sexual orientation out of their discussions.

So, McDonnell hasn't really
changed, has he? He's just keeping his bigotry a little closer to the vest
these days.

2 comments:

You DO know what McDonnell needs don't you? A good (use your imagination). I should be ashamed to say this but I would do it. Who knows, he might just like IT. And that my friends I think is at the root of the governor's "problem" with homosexuals.